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Given the numbers involved, 20 crew and 4 pirates, and my general ignorance of all things maritime, I wonder if the pirates are typically outnumbered like that and usually crews just acquiesce (I don’t blame the crews if that’s the case). Or if there is not normally a 5:1 crew:pirate ratio making pirate eviction less likely.

What’s really amazing is how an afternoon confined to my desk trying to locate microarray data files will permit such musing in the first place.

I don’t think the 2nd Amendment enters into it here, does it? After all, the piracy problem is well known by now — surely the crew was packing legally?

Anyway, what I want to know is why it seems like the US Navy is taking point on this. Isn’t India the largest power in the area? Where’s South Africa, or Kenya, or Pakistan, or, hell, why not, Indonesia?

International naval forces from several countries, including the U.S. Navy, are sending vessels to the scene. According to one source, the pirates are essentially “all alone, more then 300 miles out to sea, and warships from several countries are on the way.”

I’m impressed too. Mainly by the fact that the crew decided it was worth doing, because fighting is normally a no-win situation for the crew. If they just put their hands up they eventually get ransomed, they’re on the clock the whole time, and for all I know get some compensation for the ordeal. If they fight back, they can get dead — and as far as I know the owners don’t pay them any bonuses.

Either way, props to the crew. They’re doing the rest of us a service.

I do wonder, though, why the Navy doesn’t dispatch a squad of Marines to ships entering those waters and pull them off (by helicopter) on departure. That’s what the USMC was created to do, after all, and any pirate crew going after a ship with a squad of US Marines aboard would discover a new appreciation for the difference between “amateur” and “professional.”

The actual and really interestinjg thing here is that Omar Jamal, head of the Somali Justice Asoc. is apparently negotiating with the remaining pirate.
Interesting because he is the spokesmann in MPLS for Somali’s, and even more interesting because so-called Somali terorist have been swept under the rug, and in the case of Mohammed Warsame, imprisoned for four plus years without trial: but pirates are just plain ol’ fun, and more interesting than American civil liberties…

The best part was when they tried to barter for the captain back with food. The crew’s spokesman was saying ‘it’s uh.. not going too good at the moment’. Broke up an otherwise typically monotonous day of listening to news feeds.

About this blog

The science is mostly climate change, life science, evolution, and science education. The science policy and politics is mostly about climate change and the evolution-creationism false controversy. The technology is mostly about Linux, regular normal person computer use, kids programming, and now and then, household items.

As an Anthropologist and Africanist, I often write about those topics as well.

Usually, I write about one or two topics for a while then shift to something different. This is not systematic, and has to do with context and external forces such as: Is this a presidential election year? Are we having an El Nino? Is there a fight going on somewhere about teaching creationism in a public school? Did I just get a cool new robot toy? Like that.

So, if you don't find the most recent few posts interesting, have a look at the topics below. But, of course, chances are you got here with a Google search and you'll never read this "about" thing.